Colin Packham PlanetArk 21 Jan 15;
Weather models show a low chance of an El Nino, the Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) said on Tuesday, after indicators of the climate event eased in recent weeks.
El Nino - a warming of sea-surface temperatures in the Pacific - can prompt drought in Southeast Asia and Australia and heavy rains in South America, hitting production of food such as rice, wheat and sugar.
The BOM had previously forecast a 70 percent chance that El Nino would arrive by February with indicators hovering close to El Nino thresholds for much of the second half of 2014. But climate indicators have eased in recent weeks, the bureau said.
"Central tropical Pacific Ocean surface temperatures have fallen by around half a degree from their peak of 1.1 degree Celsius above average in late November," it said in a statement.
The high Pacific Ocean temperatures in 2014 was a key determinant of the hot, dry weather across much of Australia, Asia, South America and southern Africa, the BOM had said in a statement in December.
(Editing by Richard Pullin and Himani Sarkar)
